Locals recall historic 'Dream' speech

By CHRISTOPHER THOMAS - Daily News Staff

Published: Tuesday, August 27, 2013 at 05:35 PM.

When Gloria Goodwin, then Baker, was 13, she and her family packed up their car and made the 400-mile trip north from Catawba County to attend the march. The experience left an indelible impression on Goodwin.

“I was overwhelmed by the mass of people there. People from every state came together…black and white people came together. We were all given buttons with two hands shaking, a black hand and a white hand. My father told me to never forget what I saw. I remember people sharing their hats and food and water…it was a time for unity,” she said.

When Dr. King gave his speech, people cried. Goodwin called the experience “astounding.”

“I didn’t know how famous that speech would be 40 years later. To stand there and hear it was overwhelming. I can remember my daddy crying,” she said.

At the end, Goodwin said the crowd sang “We Shall Overcome” and held hands.

Washington, D.C.in late August is usually balmy and humid, but the weather was the last thing on Delilah Marrow’s mind as she stood on the National Mall on Aug. 28, 1963.

She was one of the estimated 250,000 people there as the Reverend Dr. Martin Luther King give his “I Have a Dream” speech.

“I got a good view of Dr. King and everyone else on the stage,” said Marrow. “It was very exciting to be there.”

The excitement and pride running through Marrow were a long cry from the life she remembers in Jones County during the era of state sanctioned segregation. Marrow was born and raised on a farm just outside of town during the Great Depression and wartime era, when the nearly 1 million blacks living in the state (as of 1940) were forced to live under a series of discriminatory laws nicknamed “Jim Crow” laws. According to Marrow, the “Separate but Equal” laws of the day only lived up to half of its promise.

“It was awful,” Marrow said. “We always got school books after the white children used them. They were usually torn and tattered by then. The buses we used to get to school would often break down. We would often miss our first class of the day because of the buses. Sometimes we’d have to catch the buses coming in from Onslow County. We’d be late, but we’d get there.”

Marrow, a graduate of Jones County Training School and North Carolina A&T, said the sub-standard treatment of blacks in the state wasn’t restricted to the classroom. Mistrust and harassment could be found on city streets and shops from Maysville to Greensboro.

“We had to walk into town to go shopping (in Greensboro) since we couldn’t use public transportation,” said Marrow. “Racial slurs would be yelled at us from the windows, though we were never touched. When you went into a store, you were watched … You couldn’t try on hats because our heads were considered ‘germy.’ It was very degrading. It takes away all the pride you had in yourself. It makes you feel like less of a person.”

After graduating from college in 1952, Marrow married a soldier and the new family traveled the world. By 1963, the Marrows were in Washington, D.C. and Delilah was working with the federal government in a building near the National Mall, where the March on Washington would take place. During that time, a young minister out of Atlanta named Martin Luther King Jr. was gaining notoriety by staging boycotts and sit-ins through the south. Marrow said that King’s message and actions helped her take back the pride she lost while living in segregated south.

“I grew up timid and shy and part of that was from intimidation that was practiced in our community,” said Marrow. “I was quite proud of him for taking the initiative.”

When the march took place, Marrow said her church was open to weary travelers who spent the night before the march on the floors there. The next morning, with banners and signs in hand, members of the church joined hundreds of thousands of others as they made their way to the Lincoln Memorial to watch the presentation. Remarks, prayers and music were made through the course of the day, including performances from Bob Dylan and Marian Anderson. The program reached its height when King took the stage and delivered a 17-minute speech that would become the crown jewel in his legacy. Marrow said the event had a lasting impression on her.

“I had a different sense of pride about myself ... I felt strong,” said Marrow. “I felt able to do anything that I could be a real person. I didn't have to be second class and I could reach for my highest potential. It was a life-changing experience.”

Marrow said she also saw a change in the country following the speech, which was broadcast on television and radio and reached homes from coast to coast.

“It was a wakeup call,” Marrow said. “We didn’t need to keep allowing ourselves to be put down. We need to stand up and speak.”

Marrow said she has since attended anniversary commemorations of the march and in the 50 years since the march took place, she’s seen parts of Dr. King’s speech come true as segregation is no longer the law of the land in any state. Marrow believes, though, there is still work to be done.

“I hope this will be a just and free world (50 years from now),” said Marrow. “I hope people will have more meaningful lives to live. I hope there will be jobs for everyone and you don’t have to scrap around and shoot each other to survive. I hope we can find a way to live together peacefully. Dr. King would not approve of all the violence we see today.

“If he had lived, I believe people would be behaving much differently.”

A day of celebration

In 1963, James Brewster was a young seminary student studying in the capital and living just over the Potomac River in the still-segregated Arlington County, Va. What he saw not only in the schools and theaters in Virginia, but also in his own Methodist denomination, troubled Brewster.

He believes it went against the very foundation of Methodism, a church founded by an advocate for social justice in his own time, John Wesley. Though his own church didn’t support the march, Brewster believed the decision to attend was simple.

“I wanted to be part of something that confirmed my own believes that all persons are created equal and segregation was not part of God’s plan,” he said.

At the march, he stood diagonal to the stage and wasn’t very close. There were buses parked all along the road and police standing along the road to prevent a riot.

“I felt anxiety about that,” Brewster said, “but when you’re right in the middle of the march, everyone was joyful, eager.”

Brewster remembers that day not so much as a protest, but a celebration.

“All the major labor leaders were there. The theme of the march was Jobs and Freedom. I was impressed by the ecumenical nature of the protests. It was an interface witness. There was major electricity in the crowd. The local churches were so convinced it would be violent, yet it had this Ghandian result,” he said.

A time for unity

When Gloria Goodwin, then Baker, was 13, she and her family packed up their car and made the 400-mile trip north from Catawba County to attend the march. The experience left an indelible impression on Goodwin.

“I was overwhelmed by the mass of people there. People from every state came together…black and white people came together. We were all given buttons with two hands shaking, a black hand and a white hand. My father told me to never forget what I saw. I remember people sharing their hats and food and water…it was a time for unity,” she said.

When Dr. King gave his speech, people cried. Goodwin called the experience “astounding.”

“I didn’t know how famous that speech would be 40 years later. To stand there and hear it was overwhelming. I can remember my daddy crying,” she said.

At the end, Goodwin said the crowd sang “We Shall Overcome” and held hands.

She said the march made the country “a better place to be.”

“I was present for both Obama inaugurations ... I reflected on where I was standing in 1963 and I was almost in the exact same spot in 2009 (for the concert preceding President Obama’s inauguration at the Lincoln Memorial) ,” Goodwin said. “I witnessed segregation, integration and the inauguration.

“I’ve come full circle.”

Christopher Thomasis a staff writer for the Jacksonville Daily News. To contact him, call him at 910-219-8473 or e-mail him at christopher.thomas@jdnews.com.